Free speech is a helluva thing… 

Much like Oregon, Hawaii attracts a lot of people running from their problems.  Never mind the fact that their underlying struggles are typically self inflicted and will follow them to the ends of the Earth, this little far flung archipelago presents a tempting fantasy of warm tropical days unburdened by past or proclivity. Reality is, of course, different, but that’s a fact that’s hard to appreciate until you’re staring down the barrel of our insane cost of living, lack of affordable housing, and laughably low wages.

And so a steady stream of mainland origin flights spew forth their daily assault of stinking filthy, dirty, hippy fools, nothing to lose junkie scumbags, gutter punk status dropouts, kid diddler ex-cons, and wild-eyed Jesus freaks.

Most will try and fail, others will end up dead by overdose or misadventure, but the very worst will find a toe hold and set roots like a pestilent haole weed.

For the last five years Lincoln Park, in Hilo, has been forced to deal with a nightmare transplant of the delusionally hateful god-shouter set.

James Borden, a 64-year-old Massachusetts native, has taken it upon himself to follow in the footsteps of his haole forerunners and use the location as a sounding board for his unique brand of hateful nonsensicality.

His church, the Yaweh Lincoln Park Ministry, which consists of a pickup truck with large signs affixed to the tailgate, has enlightened the local community with many bits of his home brewed wisdom over the last few years, such as “Homos using children to promote queer lifestyle” and  “Muslim Obama’s Islam go back to Saudi Arabiai [sic].”

Borden has been largely tolerated or ignored by the local community, wisely so, as it’s important to let the dumbest shout their stupid opinions so you can properly vet your own, lest you find yourself in agreement.

“You know, I always thought Borden was a moron, but his recent message about the president being a secret lizard sodomite from Kenya who smokes cigarettes and is in league with the Jew cabal living at the center of the Earth really struck a chord with me…”  Oops, time to reevaluate some stuff.

However, his latest sign has struck a nerve, featuring large depiction of what is purportedly an aborted fetus. It’s gross, everyone is really bummed out, and they’ve decided enough is enough.

Armed with signs bearing positive messages like “Live Aloha, “Honk if you love Obama,” and “A’ole racism” they’ve begun a counter protest hoping to… well, I don’t know what they really hope to accomplish.

Beyond the indisputable legality of his actions Borden actually has supporters, like mental giant, George Krail (click here):

“My wife was here earlier, and her and I were healed of the two abortions we had,” Krail said. “We were for abortion, we came to Christ, and somebody like Jim (Borden), showing us the picture of the baby, we were like my gosh, that’s what we did. That’s the reality of what we did, and that’s what turned us around.” 

And so continues another example of America’s proud tradition of religious zealots using notions of liberty in their quest to deny rights to other people who aren’t hurting anyone.

Fortunately for us, the zeitgeist is currently skewing agnostic.

Finally, Big Island is a crazy place with its own notions of frontier justice.

I will not be surprised if Borden’s corpse finds itself stuffed into a lava tube on undeveloped land in the very near future.